FIFTY YEARS OF EUROPEAN COOPERATION IN SPACE Building on its past, ESA shapes the future

This book details fifty years of European collaboration in space from the origins of the programme in 1964 to its rich complexity today. It charts the early moves by scientific statesmen and governments to establish not one, but two organisations, ESRO for science and later applications and ELDO for launchers.
The tight financial constraints on ESRO, the tribulations of ELDO's launcher, and a major tilt towards close technological cooperation with NASA in the early 1970s led to the formation of a single organisation in 1975, ESA.
ESA embarked on developing a new European launcher under French leadership (Ariane), and a human-rated capsule for scientific experiments to fit in the Space Shuttle's cargo bay under German leadership (Spacelab). Its science programme was put on a secure institutional footing and it launched a number of applications programmes. The 1980s are marked by the spectacular success of Ariane, the consolidation of a human presence in space through Spacelab and collaboration in the International Space Station, the development of a new framework for rationalising space science and bruising disputes over engaging users to operate application satellites. The global upheavals of the 1990s, the interest of the private sector in space, and an awareness of the value of space-based systems to civil society and military action on the ground obliged ESA to refashion itself again. New partnerships were forged. The launcher fleet was expanded to include the Russian Soyuz and the Italian-led Vega, a single European Astronaut Corps was created, and major new programmes for Earth observation (GMES) and satellite navigation (Galileo) were embarked on in cooperation with the European Union. The history of Europe's presence in space is above all a history of political will, of industrial development, and of the consolidation of extensive scientific, technological and managerial competencies to construct a global space power that could compete and collaborate from a position of strength with the US and the USSR/Russia, while adapting to the changing demands of a new geopolitical world order in the 21st century.

SOMMAIRE

Preface and acknowledgments

Chapter 1: Origins
Chapter 2: The early history of ESRO
Chapter 3: The early history of ELDO
Chapter 4: Implementing ESRO’s first scientific programme
Chapter 5: The science programme in the late 1960s: LAS and COS-B
Chapter 6: The crisis in ELDO in the late 1960s and the first Package Deal for ESRO
Chapter 7: ESRO embarks on applications : the telecommunications satellite programme
Chapter 8: ESRO embarks on applications (with France): Europeanising Meteosat
Chapter 9: ESRO embarks on applications (with the US): the aeronautical satellite
Chapter 10: US-European relations: the Post-Apollo programme, Intelsat, and the availability of US launchers
Chapter 11: European participation in the development of the Space Shuttle: a victory for clean interfaces
Chapter 12: The collapse of ELDO and the Second Package Deal
Chapter 13: Establishing the European Space Agency and the ESA Convention
Chapter 14: Negotiating the Science Programme in the 1970s: Hubble, ISPM and Giotto
Chapter 15: From applications satellites to operating organisations: ECS and Eutelsat
Chapter 16: From applications satellites to operating organisations: Marots and Inmarsat, Meteosat and Eumetsat
Chapter 17: From LIIIS to Arianespace
Chapter 18: Getting Spacelab built
Chapter 19: Using Spacelab for science
Chapter 20: Planning ahead for science in the 1980s: Horizon 2000
Chapter 21: Relaunching ESA: the Ministerial Meetings of 1985 and 1987
Chapter 22: From Ariane 4 to Ariane 5
Chapter 23: The European family of launchers
Chapter 24: The International Space Station
Chapter 25: International planetary science in the 90s and beyond: Saturn, Mars and ITAR
Chapter 26: The European Global Navigation Satellite System Galileo: I. From conception to development
Chapter 27: The European Global Navigation Satellite System Galileo: II. From development to implementation
Chapter 28: Earth Observation. From Earthnet to GMES/Copernicus 385
Annex I: Chronology
Annex II: ESRO, ELDO and ESA launches and related missions
Annex III: Planned ESA launches and related missions
Annex IV: ESRO, ELDO and ESA Council Chairmen and Directors General
Annex V: Bibliography
Annex VI: Acronyms
Annex VII: Index of names
Annex VIII: Index